The production of tile and the craft of tiling: method of tile production from the 18th century to the present day

Abstract

Aiming to study the hydraulic tile, the centerpiece in the nineteenth-century civil construction and considered a cultural heritage by Iphan, this research traces the historical trajectory of this material. Although the patrimonial charters recommend periodic maintenance actions of preventive conservation, there is a gap on the hydraulic tile records, mainly regarding its creation and its manufacture technique. This article points out the manufacture of ceramic tile as a precursor of the hydraulic tile, focusing on the reasons that led to such a transformation. The results show that the production of hydraulic tiles was brought back in the transition from the eighteenth to the nineteenth century, with new significations and values that updated the meaning of the material use, elevating it to a protagonist of the environment for which it is conceived. In order to contribute to the record of the historical genesis of the hydraulic tile, this study also carries out an extensive review of the relevant publications on the subject.